Victims of the widening spyware scandal in Spain are demanding justice and reparations, following revelations that journalists, lawyers, civil society and politicians had been targeted.
“We are seeking reparations and a clear commitment of the Spanish state to stop such practices against political dissidents,” Elisenda Paluzie, told MEPs on Tuesday (29 November).
Paluzie, a prominent Catalan economist and academic, had been targeted by Pegasus, an Israeli-made spyware that can take full control over a person’s mobile phone.
Paluzie said the attacks happened on the first day of internal elections to the Catalan National Assembly, an independence organisation. Those elections were held on June 10, 2020.
“The attacks were designed to trigger an impulse reaction the click the links,” she said. Citizen Lab, a Canadian laboratory based out of the University of Toronto, said the attack masqueraded as a Twitter update from a Catalan newspaper.
Paluzie is among the 65 known people targeted by spyware in Spain.
Of those, 63 were attacked or infected by Pegasus, while another four by Candiru, a mercenary Israeli spyware, according to Citizen Lab.
Nikolaj Nielsen